He alluded that they helped to hide her body to cover up the alleged crime.

Amaral is the ex-police officer who led the initial hunt when three-year-old Maddie went missing from the Praia da Luz resort in Portugal in May 3, 2007.

On the same TV show, in response dad Gerry McCann said: "The less said about Goncalo Amaral the better."

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The shock documentary revealed a new key witness – who worked at the resort – is being sought.

A senior professor also claimed Maddie could have been knocked down by a drink-driver after leaving the apartment to search for her parents.

It also suggested the driver could have thrown her body in one of the 600 wells in the area – or disposed of it in mountain caves near to Praia da Luz.

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TRAGEDY: Maddie went missing from her family flat in Praia Da Luz in Portugal

A spokesman for the McCanns previously asked the documentary-makers to hand over any “credible” evidence to police.

He said: “If the Australian TV show contains any credible, fresh lines of inquiry they should, of course, have been given immediately to the police.”

Amaral had claimed in a 2008 book that Maddie had died in the family’s holiday flat in Praia Da Luz and her parents faked her abduction to cover up the tragedy.

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Kate McCann (L) and her husband Gerry McCann (R), parents of missing British youngster Madeleine McCann, leave the court house in Lisbon after delivering statements in their case against Portuguese police officer Goncalo Amaral on July 8, 2014

He was ordered to pay Kate and Gerry £430,000 plus interest in damages after losing round one.

But this decision was reversed by appeal judges in April last year.

There is no suggestion Maddie's parents had anything to do with her death or any cover up or any link to Amaral's MI5 claims.

A spokesman for the McCanns dismissed the entire Aussie documentary.

He said “there was nothing new at all in the Seven Network piece.”

He added that there “will be no comment from Kate and Gerry whatsoever.

“The interview with them that was carried in the programme was also some six years old, so it was in a highly misleading way.”